Taylor Hackford’s The Devil’s Advocate is a downright seductive motion picture, enticing its audience with smart dialogue, fascinating characters, extraordinary performances, and a pace that’s as crisp as they come.
Kevin Lomax (Keanu Reeves) is a lawyer from Gainesville, Florida. A former prosecutor and current defense attorney, he’s never lost a case. Not one. And that perfect record catches the attention of John Milton (Al Pacino), the most powerful lawyer - and one of the most powerful men - in New York City. Milton offers Kevin a job, and before the young go-getter knows what’s hit him, both he and his wife Mary Ann (Charlize Theron) are living in a luxury apartment with a great view of the city. Even in New York, Kevin proves unbeatable, but Mary Ann senses something is wrong with the entire set-up, and that Milton is not who he seems to be. As for Kevin, he’s too busy raking in the cash to notice anything out of the ordinary. That is, until his world starts crashing down around him. Al Pacino is brilliant as the charismatic Milton, a guy with more than a few dark secrets, but I was really impressed with Keanu Reeves’ turn as the hotshot lawyer who, over the course of the movie, goes from “up-and-coming” to “already arrived”. The supporting cast (especially Theron as the confused wife and Connie Nielson as Kevin’s sexy co-worker) is also strong, and the courtroom scenes, even when they’re brief (which many are), have an undeniable energy to them. A first-rate thriller that dabbles in horror, The Devil’s Advocate is top-notch entertainment.
Rating: 9.5 out of 10
